Target Unprepared For Fashionista Barrage, Suffers Site Crash

In its efforts to position itself on the high end of the discount store spectrum, Target secured a limited-edition line from a beloved Italian design company. Missoni for Target drew such heavy demand Tuesday that Target.com crashed, redirecting users to a screen that read “Woof! We are suddenly extremely popular. There is no need to refresh your browser. Please stay here and we’ll get you in as soon as we can! Thank you and our apologies for the inconvenience.”

The New York Times reports Target.com’s traffic was higher than Black Friday, which is traditionally its busiest day of the year. Non-Target Missoni items can cost in the hundreds and thousands of dollars.

The website failure arrived as Target switched to its own platform after breaking off from Amazon three weeks ago, but a spokesperson for the company told the Times that the site’s problems were solely due to the traffic barrage.

The CEO of digital marketing firm Deep Focus told the Times that Target’s inability to handle the traffic is inexcusable: “It’s saying, ‘We’re so popular we had to turn people away at the door.’ Then get a bigger place.”